Praise for a loon: How a rare bird died in a city park

A rare visitor to Shanghai was found dead in a park several weeks ago, apparently the victim of oil poisoning.

The black-throated wolf, also known as the Arctic diver, would not normally venture into Shanghai. Experts believe it may have landed in Century Park due to irritation caused by oil stains on its feathers.

Their first sightings in January sent hordes of birdwatchers and photographers to the park. They were greeted with the sad sight of a desperate bird using its beak to try and remove the oil coated abdomen.

Forest authorities and ornithologists tried in vain to save the bird. When He Xin, an assistant researcher at the Shanghai Museum of Natural History, arrived at the scene, the wolf had died.

“The body was floating meters from the shore,” he said. “Other wild birds were swimming around him, trying to figure out what happened to this friend from afar.”

He Xin

The black-throated wolf breeds mainly in northern Europe and Asia, usually migrating north in February and March through eastern China. However, actual sightings in Shanghai have been in the single digits for the past century.

The researcher assumed that it was the oil that killed the bird, according to the witnesses of its last days.

Lu Yang, a local bird photographer, said he observed the bird diving up and down in the lake, pecking its feathers.

“He could have been doing it for a long time for the cumulative oil intake to poison him,” he said. “It’s a shame because the bird was a rare guest in the city.”

The origin of the oil is unknown, although it was probably marine oil from the unloading of ships in and around ports.

He explained that lubricating oil, motor oil and boat fuel will float in the sea and stick to the feathers of waterfowl, which can cripple their ability to fly and eventually poison them. They can’t remove the sticky mass on their own, he added.

“This pollution is the inevitable result of ocean trade,” he said. “It seems like an unsolvable dilemma. This bird’s tragedy may tell us something about how humans have been impacting the Earth.”

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He recalled a happier visit from a black-throated wolf in 2018, when a healthier specimen spent 68 days in the park’s same lake before leaving.

Loons typically don’t cross the coast to come inland unless they’re uncomfortable or contaminated by oil, he said.

In 2017, a red-throated pufferfish died after spending nine days at the Sanjiagang Marine Park in Pudong. Members of a Shanghai birdwatching club tracked its disappearance.

Writing on the website Shanghaibirding.com, founder Craig Brelsford wrote that one of the group members observed the wolf constantly trying to groom itself, with oil smeared on one of its flanks.

“It is not clear what killed the bird, but it may have been slowly poisoned by ingesting oil that had collected in its feathers,” Brelsford wrote.

Just last month, another oil-contaminated red-throated wolf was found in Dishui Lake in Pudong’s Lingang area. The forest station staff tried to rescue the bird twice without success.

Jiang Xiaowei / BRILLIANT

Zhang Tai, deputy director of the Pudong Forestry Station, said it was too difficult to catch the wolf, which can not only fly but also dive.

Oil and wildlife are a toxic combination around the world, and rescue attempts are often futile. A major oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico killed at least 80,000 birds of more than 100 species. Experience shows that even when birds are rescued from oil spills, they often die in the end, he said.

“It requires highly professional rescue work, such as heating the birds immediately and using eco-friendly detergent to remove the oil,” he said. “There have been some successful cases overseas, but almost none in China.”

Shanghai, he added, does not have enough professional experience in wildlife rescue, unlike Beijing, where professional rescuers, including veterinarians, are immediately dispatched to the scene.

“We have researchers and forestry officials to provide advice here in Shanghai, but they are not professional wildlife rescuers. Sometimes we have to rely on the Shanghai Zoo to lend a hand,” he explained.

Developing clean energy will help mitigate risks to migratory birds, he said.

China is amending its ocean environmental protection laws to increase oversight of pollutant emissions and monitoring of the marine environment.

Three HY series satellites have been launched to provide 24/7 observation of China’s ocean environment.

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Shanghai, a major stopover on the Asian-Australasian migration route, is also making more efforts to provide ideal winter environments for the birds.

By the end of 2022, 519 species of wild birds were recorded in the city, including 40 listed as “threatened” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.

Shanghai currently operates 4,655 square kilometers of wetlands, according to Sun Xiaohong, an inspector from the city’s ecology and environment bureau.

Notably, the Chongming Dongtan National Nature Reserve, one of the city’s two top-ranked wetlands, has recorded the presence of 2,900 Tundra Swans this winter, a breed that was nearly extinct in the city. This is the largest figure in the last two decades.

The number peaked at about 3,000 in the 1980s, before the alien cordgrass began destroying some of the habitat, officials said on World Wetlands Day on Feb. 2. A campaign to eradicate cordgrass has improved the situation.

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Bird photographer Lu said he loved taking photos of the city’s birds.

“We hope more healthy migratory birds will visit the city,” he said.

Meanwhile, the unfortunate black-throated wolf that died will be preserved as a specimen after it was recovered by taxidermists at the Shanghai Natural History Museum.

“It’s hard to get the oil out of his feather,” taxidermist Shan Kun said. “We’ve had to clean their feathers more than 10 times, but some yellow and brown spots persist.”

The museum will exhibit the bird against the backdrop of a native habitat.

Jiang Xiaowei / BRILLIANT